


it's fine

by inconsequentia



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: College, Gen, internalized ableism, vent fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-25
Updated: 2019-09-25
Packaged: 2020-10-28 09:43:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20776496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inconsequentia/pseuds/inconsequentia
Summary: Bitty isn't overwhelmed. He isn't.





	it's fine

**Author's Note:**

> internalized ableism tag is because Bitty has this idea that he has to be struggling "enough" to seek out assistance and some other thoughts he has about his inability to finish his paper.

Bitty doesn’t even feel like he’s doing all that much. He’s taking classes and barely managing to finish his work well enough and soon enough to do well in them. He’s on the hockey team and barely keeping up with players. But barely is still a success. There’s no reason for him to be crying.

He knows he should be working on his paper. He has to write five pages before a morning class tomorrow, but he’s sitting in the library with twitter up on his phone, scrolling aimlessly while he adamantly ignores the tears escaping his eyes. He wishes he could manage to start his essay. He’s tried countless times to just read the documents they were given, but the ancient, scanned in text from 17something makes his tears worse and his brain feels like it’s going to shut down. 

He knows that he has to be at practice later tonight. He knows that he will likely pull an all-nighter at this rate and still have to deal with the rest of the week. He knows he needs to work, but he can’t.

He almost wishes that someone would notice that he’s crying and help him. What would some random stranger be able to do, though? Magically fix his ability to work? Write his paper for him? The thought makes Bitty scoff. He’s fucked and he knows it.

He could probably sit down and write out a whole script for his vlog that is two times as long as the upper limit of the paper. But that’s not what the professor wants. Apparently, the professor wants Bitty in tears wishing for a break from life because of stupid illegible text and “f” instead of “s”.

College was meant to be more stressful, but also a reprieve from the atmosphere he dealt with at home. Why wasn’t he able to deal with this?

Bitty glances at the time on his phone. Another half an hour just wasted because he can’t even help himself by getting something done in what time he has. He could just skip hockey and his first-class tomorrow. That’s wishful thinking, though. If he doesn’t go to class, he’s even more likely to fall behind. If he doesn’t go to hockey, the team will be mad or concerned-which is worse- and he’ll lose his scholarship.

He just has to finish this paper. Just sit up and switch tabs on his laptop. It’s so physically easy. Why won’t his brain just function?

Bitty can feel the dread overwhelming him. The more he thinks about it, the worse he feels. He can’t stop thinking about it because, even if he’s going to get nothing done, if he’s at least thinking about it, it's not laziness. He thinks he might be lying to himself, but its better than nothing.

The tears in his eyes start coming faster and stronger. It’s becoming harder to breathe. He’s still in public at the library. He can’t even hold himself together, much less write a paper. Why did he think he’d make it in college.

He’s still crying, sobbing at this point, when a librarian comes by. She seems concerned, but she’s probably just annoyed at him for making everyone listen to his ugly breathing. 

“Are you okay?” She asks, and, really? Does he look okay? He’s almost positive his eyes are red and his face is blotchy. His eyelashes are probably clumped together with the way they do when he cries. It’s almost as annoying as the crying itself. 

“Not quite,” he manages to get out, “Sorry, I'll be quieter.” He runs his hand over his eyes. It doesn’t really help. He’s cried enough at this point that his face is going to be damp unless he gets a towel or something. Annoying.

“Oh, no, that isn’t what I was concerned about. You’re crying. Is there anything I can do to help.”

Bitty wishes. He doesn’t even have a problem with the paper’s content. He just can’t process these sources enough to incorporate the information in them. He knows how to start if he ever manages to make that happen.

“I’ll be fine. Just a bit stressed.” Maybe ‘just a bit’ isn’t right, but it isn’t her job to deal with whatever is wrong with him. 

She doesn’t seem to believe him, but she obviously isn’t going to argue with him.

“You can always go to the campus counseling center if you need to. They have free walk-in services.” 

She seems content to have reminded him about the counseling center he’s heard plenty about at various orientation events, and she wanders away back into the shelves.

Bitty doesn’t have time for therapy. Bitty hasn’t been on the team very long, but he’s been around Shitty enough to accept that it isn’t the weakness that the south demonizes it to be. He just doesn’t need it. He’s a bit stressed out, but it’s mostly his fault anyway. If he had done some of this over the weekend, he wouldn’t be crying now.

Nevermind that when he tried to work on Sunday, he had the same problem that plagues him today.

He can't spare the time to go there, even if it were a problem enough to need therapy. He’s fine. Just stressed a bit. That’s normal, right? He sees it constantly. Everyone cries sometimes because of college. Something else Shitty had made sure all the frogs knew was that crying wasn’t bad. It didn’t make anyone ‘less of a man’, though his air quoted phrase set him off into another lecture about how that shouldn’t be an issue and gender is fake anyway. Bitty had to leave, then, because the kitchen timer rang, but he’s glad that the team isn’t going to mock him if he ends up doing this more often. 

He thinks it's a bad sign that he’s anticipating crying more often, even in the haus.

Maybe he could go to the counseling center after he turned in this paper. Maybe he could use the help.

**Author's Note:**

> How better to deal with this exact situation than writing fic about not doing work.... vent fic time tm


End file.
